Someone Is Waiting
by Keidara
Summary: The child of the group wishes his words could be heard.
1. Chapter 1

**Someone Is Waiting  
**

I broke something important today.

I know that I should apologize but the words don't ever come out right. I'm not good with words like Hakkai is, so I can't make the apology pretty. I can't even yell or flirt until I am forgiven like Gojyo would. And Sanzo; What good would trying to harm my friends do? Even my fourth companion can not offer me any advice.

I know someone is waiting for me to speak.

They don't expect me to apologize. They don't even think I am capable of understanding anything beyond food, sleep, and how to do my job. I am an important part of the group but there's no way the others see me as an equal. I am just a baby, treated like a pet to them.

I realize that I can't speak words they will understand. I can speak, yes, but they do not know the heart of a child. They can not see the infinite wisdom my unique lineage has given me. They can not hear the centuries I spent in isolation, waiting for a chance to return to their side. These fools can not see how much I gave up to find them again. And I can't tell them.

But even if I can't, I know. Someone is waiting for me to curl up on their pillow after sundown, _kyuu_ softly into their hair, and whisper my apology in the words of dreams so that this someone, this broken boy of a man, can smile and accept my apology without words.

Someone is waiting for me.


	2. The Past

Kubota and Tokito

They have never met their otherworldly counterparts.

I have always wondered… Despite the difference in time zone, age, fashion, and eye color, why their transient souls have somehow remained true. Not pure, certainly, for they've changed almost as much as I have over the millennia. They share the folly of man, the naivette of youth, but each of them is true to each other; true to their other selves or their counterparts in each resurrection. When I think about it, this phenomenon is not truly that much of a surprise. It is my fault, of course. It always was.

When given the opportunity to be the hero or follow common sense, I froze. I could have attempted the capture of the four criminals. I could have fought back. Instead, I just let them bind my body as they had marked my soul eons ago. I was the one who fought for their souls to be 'damned' to Earth for the many incarnations to come. Even then, I could not leave them, could I? I fought, I died, I lived for them again when they met the Sun on Earth and his Light. From Lord of the Heavens, I became a Lord of the Sky for six hundred long years, waiting for their true rebirth. From that, I became nothing for even longer.

It began with Tenpou, as it always did. I did not know it until much later but that meeting was also the result of my own actions. I had mentioned, in passing, that the Western Infantry was losing more equipment than men. I had not been aware that the ever-nosy Merciful Goddess would hear of my verbal thoughts, nor that she would forcefully guide (read: blackmail) my way up the ladder. By the time I became a Warrant Officer, Kanzeon already had control of my fate.

I had control over nothing. On a fateful day, I was summoned into my Captain's room in full regalia. He wasn't there. Instead, a battle weary colonel sat behind the desk, looking at me like a worm looked at a bug when a bird flew overhead.

He asked if I was confused.

I was uncertain of what to say. I paused to think. I knew the Colonel hated that. He felt as if I was purposefully making him wait. Tenpou told me years later that he learned patience by taking joy from making this man ever so slightly annoyed. Tenpou learned humility soon after because I would not take the same treatment, but it was a bond of amusement that never separated from us. In tribute to what not-yet was, I said simply, "No, sir."

Unconcerned of repercussions, I met the eyes of my fellow bugs. They were all greener than I. Among the lower gods gathered, Tenpou stood out. He was young and, as all the young are, significantly less naive than their elders chose to think. He did not seem naive at this moment. Tenpou wisely kept his gaze trained straight ahead, ignoring the others in the room. Later that day I would feel mortified when I realized that I did not recognize him on the spot.

These men must hate me, I thought to myself often in those days. Lust was not the same game for my kind as it was for theirs. My brethren went hot, then icy, burning with intense flames of desire that stung the veins. Like the bloodlust it resembled, true violent sex was cold.

These hot blooded mammals were never satisfied. I did not know what to make of him. His hair was long and it hung from every angle, not stiff but not fluid. His eyes shone like liquid glass, reflecting precisely what you expected to see and nothing more. He was an intrigue right from the start. An anonymous god, no name for himself but for his own… Tenpou's pulse sped beneath his skin, racing as it would often from that night onward for reasons neither of us yet knew.

We were about to be informed of one.

"If you are not confused, why are you here?"

I wanted to give a swift answer. I also wanted to be respectful. Those wants were, as of yet, incompatible. "I have not been informed. Sir."

The Colonel walked to where he could look into my eyes, forcing me to meet his decisive gaze. I did not look away. "Your captain is dead, boy, and both lieutenants, too.

The words hurt me as a citizen, not a soldier. I had not been with the unit long enough to feel possessive of my superior officers, but I suddenly had the longing to have truly met them before they died. Thoughts of the past two years of service played like a soundless slideshow behind my eyes. A keening sound was trapped in my throat and I refused to let it into the open air with the present company. My eyes did not waver from just over the Colonel's right shoulder, locked onto the picture frame that hung there.

This, my first experience with _death_, was not the end to the day's events.

Annoyance. Pain, blood. Lust. These scents bathed my senses, burning my nose by their proximity. "Scrap," the Colonel growled with a wave of defined alcoholic taint, "Tell this hunk of attitude why I have called you here."

I assumed the Colonel was talking to Tenpou: I didn't even entertain the thought that anyone else should speak. With something akin to human hope, I resisted the urge to glance at the new man as he spoke. "Sir. We are here to arrange the succession of the 33rd Battalion, sir, through non-regulation methods," he said.

"Sexual favors for promotion," was what I heard. Incredulous, I broke face and briefly met Tenpou's eyes. A youthful fire was banked there, held back, but I could find no affront at the situation. There was no shame, anger, or insult reflected in the pane of glass. Tenpou did not seem to care about what this man was asking of me. Perhaps Tenpou did not care what this man was asking of **us**. I could not fathom how our moral compasses were so different, unless, as I suspected then, Tenpou's eyes and soul were entirely separate. The personal nature of the request did not compute. Tenpou just stared into my soul, demanding answers for the crime being committed by another man. I was humbled. I was awed.

"I'm in," I hissed.


End file.
